"That seems all right," I said, and began very gingerly to raise

myself from my chair. I felt perfectly well, very light and

comfortable, and quite confident in my mind. I was going fast all

over. My heart, for example, was beating a thousand times a second,

but that caused me no discomfort at all. I looked out of the window.

An immovable cyclist, head down and with a frozen puff of dust

behind his driving-wheel, scorched to overtake a galloping char-a-banc

that did not stir. I gaped in amazement at this incredible spectacle.

"Gibberne," I cried, "how long will this confounded stuff last?"



"Heaven knows!" he answered. "Last time I took it I went to bed

and slept it off. I tell you, I was frightened. It must have lasted

some minutes, I think--it seemed like hours. But after a bit it

slows down rather suddenly, I believe."



I was proud to observe that I did not feel frightened--I suppose

because there were two of us. "Why shouldn't we go out?" I asked.



"Why not?"



"They'll see us."



"Not they. Goodness, no! Why, we shall be going a thousand times

faster than the quickest conjuring trick that was ever done. Come

along! Which way shall we go? Window, or door?"



And out by the window we went.



Assuredly of all the strange experiences that I have ever had,

or imagined, or read of other people having or imagining, that little

raid I made with Gibberne on the Folkestone Leas, under the influence

of the New Accelerator, was the strangest and maddest of all.

We went out by his gate into the road, and there we made a minute

examination of the statuesque passing traffic. The tops of the wheels

and some of the legs of the horses of this char-a-banc, the end

of the whip-lash and the lower jaw of the conductor--who was just

beginning to yawn--were perceptibly in motion, but all the rest

of the lumbering conveyance seemed still. And quite noiseless except

for a faint rattling that came from one man's throat! And as parts

of this frozen edifice there were a driver, you know, and a conductor,

and eleven people! The effect as we walked about the thing began

by being madly queer, and ended by being disagreeable. There they

were, people like ourselves and yet not like ourselves, frozen

in careless attitudes, caught in mid-gesture. A girl and a man

smiled at one another, a leering smile that threatened to last

for evermore; a woman in a floppy capelline rested her arm on

the rail and stared at Gibberne's house with the unwinking stare

of eternity; a man stroked his moustache like a figure of wax,

and another stretched a tiresome stiff hand with extended fingers

towards his loosened hat. We stared at them, we laughed at them,



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